Sensex drops over 100 points on global selloff, profit-booking

Mumbai, November 20

The benchmark BSE Sensex fell over 100 points in early session on Tuesday, breaking its three-day winning run as metal, IT, realty and banking stocks retreated, tracking sell-off in the global market.

The 30-share index dropped 104.41 points, or 0.29 per cent, to 35,670.47 points in opening trade. The gauge had rallied about 633 points in the previous three sessions.

The NSE Nifty, too, fell 36.80 points, or 0.33 per cent, to 10,726.60.

Brokers said besides a weak trend at other Asian markets amid sharp losses at the Wall Street, profit-booking by investors in recent gainers also dampened the sentiment here.

Meanwhile, signalling a temporary truce, the Reserve Bank and the government on Monday agreed to refer to an expert committee for the contentious issue of appropriate size of reserves that the RBI must hold, while restructuring of stressed loans of small businesses would be considered by the central bank.

Yes Bank emerged as the worst performer in the Sensex pack, falling 4.95 per cent after independent director Rentala Chandrashekhar resigned from the board on Monday.

Other laggards include Tata Steel, SBI, Vedanta, Maruti Suzuki, TCS, HDFC, Wipro, Sun Pharma, Kotak Bank, NTPC, Hero MotoCorp, Bajaj Auto, L&T, Infosys, PowerGrid, Axis Bank and ITC, falling up to 1.80 per cent.

However, IndusInd Bank, Tata Motors, Adani Ports, Asian Paint, M&M, ONGC, Coal India and RIL were trading up to 1.55 per cent higher.

According to provisional data, domestic institutional investors sold shares worth a net of Rs 310.26 crore, as foreign institutional investors (FIIs) bought shares to the tune of Rs 1,103.36 crore on Monday.

Elsewhere in Asia, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng dropped 2.27 per cent, Shanghai Composite Index fell 1.63 per cent, Korea’s KOSPI fell 1.15 per cent, Japan’s Nikkei shed 0.86 per cent and Taiwan index declined 0.61 per cent.

The US Dow Jones Industrial Average ended 1.56 per cent down, and NASDAQ fell over 3 per cent on Monday. PTI